It’s a thought I was pondering today, when I realised that we have been engaged for over a year & I have done absolutely nothing when it comes to the wedding. Seriously i’ve barely even thought about it let alone booked venues, shopped for a dress or picked out bomboniere.

It’s almost like having a mini panic attack just contemplating spending my life with one guy, even though he just so happens to be one hell of an awesome one. But there’s always that thought way back in the back of my mind, ‘what if there is someone else that i’m actually supposed to be with but i’m too scared to find out because I don’t want to lose what I already have & end up as eternal spinster?’.

Plus there just seems to be nothing all that special about getting married besides a sparkly new piece of jewellery & a change of surname. Oh & a lifetime of feeling like an “old married couple”.

And it just seems like there are so many things that can go wrong when two people commit to “happily” ever after. And that’s what petrifies me, there’s the potential for cheating, & boredom, & growing apart, & regretting your decision & ending up in a retirement home thinking why the fuck did I choose him/her in the first place?

Oh & then theres the whole divorce thing, which is absolutely the last thing I want to go through, some nasty divorce where the only words spoken are in anger & the only way you can look at each other is with hatred.

And I guess where this whole cold feet thing stems from is the notion that maybe, just maybe, i’m really not the settling down & getting married type. Maybe I would be quite content just committing myself to being in a relationship with one guy & just being happy with that.

And at first I was completely enamoured by the awesomeness of it all. Seriously I was spending hours refreshing my dashboard, checking out pictures of this & photos of that, it’s kinda like google image search for people who are too lazy to search google images.

Side note:  I’m finding it really great motivation for my weight loss (check out my weight loss blog here – Kaftan to Bikini), because there are so many people on tumblr that are on the same wretched journey as me & I love that, not only because it makes me feel less alone but they also post some of the most unreal motivational quotes, before & after photo’s & hot sexy fit bodies to aspire to that I have ever seen.

And whilst I have been loving tumblr, I have also been hating it at the same time, I know seems impossible but believe me it’s not. Because there are a few things on there that I find so completely disturbing im surprised i’ve been able to sleep for the past week.

And it’s not something like gay porn, or a graphic video of the colonic irrigation process, that is disturbing me so much it’s the fact that so many girls have blogs on there, & so many of those girls blogs are about how much they hate their body, & how they are desperately trying to be anorexic, & how they want to kill themselves because they feel so alone & depressed, & how some guy in some class totally ignores them & how in love with him they are & how heartbroken they are by the fact that he ignores them.

And I just want to scream at these girls, I want to shake them, & take them under my wing like a mother hen & tell them that it all works out in the end.

Because it totally does, I should know, I was the one at school who was too fat, too tall, who got bullied mercilessly, who spent her lunch hour in the toilets crying, who went through bouts of depression, & look my life has turned out just fine.

And I have to admit at first I found it interesting, then challenging, now I just find it flat out frustrating, in a - if you beat me again you can shove those damn plastic letters up your ass - kinda way.

Because I cannot for one second get past the fact that I was so good at english at school & now i’m so bad at it i’m lucky if I can construct a word longer than 4 characters &  god help the person i’m playing with if they somehow manage to come up with the Scrabble equivalent of supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.

And I have never really thought of myself as competitive, I used to do sports for the fun of it, not to win ribbons, & I think the whole ‘only child’ thing has an impact as well. I never had to share, never had to compete for attention or to get the favourite toy, because well it was just me, I had all the attention & toys I wanted.

But for some reason when it comes to board games, that competitive streak I didn’t know I had rears it’s ugly head & I will do anything to try & beat my opponent(s), you name it, cheating, crying, throwing a Suri Cruise tantrum, feigning a seizure, pretty much everything short of rohypnoling my opponent.

The good thing out of all this, is that now I know that I have this competitiveness in me, i’m going to start being a bit more assertive, more focussed, more kick-ass, just generally more – if I want something i’m going to get it & pretty much nothing is going to get in my way.

In order to tide me over until I can watch it later tonight, I just spent the last hour looking at all the photos from the red carpet, ooooooooing & ahhhhhhhhing & omg-she-can’t-seriously-think-she-looks-good-in-that-ing.

And it will probably come as no surprise to you that my Best Dressed award, because you know i’m such a well-known fashionista the whole fashion world waits for my opinion with baited breath, goes to the absolutely stunning vision of perfection, Elle Macpherson:

Closely followed by the curvacious gorgeousness of Sofia Vergara:

And the

For those of you that have been reading my blog for awhile now know, there was this guy, we hung out pretty much every day for over 4 years. We weren’t dating as such, it was more like a ‘clayton’s’ relationship, you the know the relationship you have when your not really having a relationship.

Basically we were like two peas in a pod for 4 years, we did everything together, we declared our undying love for each other, we vowed that no matter what we would always be there for each other, basically we would go to the ends of the earth for each other, pretty much a relationship in every sense, just without the wanting it to end up with a wedding & babies.

Well I haven’t seen him for 2 years, inititally it was because I was so incredibly wrapped up in the newness of my current relationship (plus the fact that my current partner banned all contact with him) that I kind of forced myself to put him at the back of my mind, you know I basically just moved on with this new guy & left him behind. Which I have to admit was probably one of the hardest things I have ever had to do.

Thing is, as it turns out, I still think about him all the time, nothing too ridiculous, just I wonder how he is going & what he is up to, none of that omg I wish I was still with him. I just think about him as a friend, who I spent alot of time with & had to go cold turkey on, & i’d like to know that he is doing ok. Totally reasonable right?

And that’s where the closure thing comes in, I didn’t have any with him, I moved on so quickly that I just didn’t get the chance, nor was I “allowed” to.

And what makes it worse is that he still text messages me 2 years later, & it’s not just the typical “hey, how’s it going?” type, but the reminders that we will always be best friends, that he will always do everything & anything for me, & that he misses me, like really misses me.

And the crazy thing is, as much as I hate to admit it, I still miss him too.

I guess there are some people in your life that you are just not meant to forget, no matter how hard you try.

But then I thought why re-hash the past 12 months, why not just look to the future instead. So to 2011, thank you for the memories, the lessons, the triumphs, the defeats, the mistakes, the good, the bad & the indifferent.

And to 2012 I welcome you with open arms. New year, new chapter, new challenges, new possibilities.

And to y’all, I truly hope your 2012 is filled with love, joy & happiness. And that all your hopes, dreams & aspirations come true.

I seriously can’t believe after all the weeks of hyped up anticipation that Christmas is over already. It felt like an eternity leading up to it, & then after a jam packed day of present unwrapping, carol singing, bon-bon pulling, party popping, wine drinking & pudding devouring, it’s all over.

And now the next countdown begins, GOODBYE 2011, HELLO 2012!!!!!!!

And whilst of course i’m looking forward to New Years Eve, mainly because it will be our 1 year engagement anniversary. Plus there’s the fireworks, oh how I love me some fireworks. I must say that it is the one time of the year that does fill me with the slightest bit of uneasiness.

I think it’s probably because i’ve had so many disastrous New Years Eve’s, usually ending up alone, crying over some guy, bottle of vino in one hand, scrunched up tissues in the other, feeling like a complete & utter failure. Oh yay such happy memories.

Plus then there’s the whole new year, new beginning, new plans, new goals, thing to deal with. I don’t know why but as much as I say I refuse to have any resolutions I usually find myself making non-resolutions, like exercise more, eat better, be more positive, get to work on time everyday, rescue stray kittens, volunteer at a homeless shelter etc etc. And before you say they are totally resolutions, I know, believe me I do it’s just I have somehow deluded myself into thinking that if I don’t refer to them as New Years Resolutions I may actually have a chance of accomplishing them.

So this New Years i’m going to try & be a little less anxious, a little less emotional, a little less non-resolution planning & a hell of alot more celebratory.

Because really at the end of the day life is meant to be lived to the absolute fullest, & that sure is not happening if your sitting on the couch feeling miserable, singing Auld Lang Syne alone, eating leftover Christmas ham, surrounded by all the friends you don’t have because you just wasted an entire year watching reality tv & feeling crap about yourself.

I haven’t been on Pinterest for that long, but so far I think the best part about it is finding a pin that inspires you so much that you just have to try it, like right that second, not a second longer.

And that’s totally how I felt when I came across some really cool photos taken with sparklers.

So last night, I cracked open some sparklers, set up the camera, roped in the other half to help & proceeded to take some long exposure sparkler photos.

And it was awesome, like squeal-worthy awesome, because once I figured out how to write backwards (it’s more difficult than you think), & not to place the red hot lighter in your bra for quick access (I now have a slightly burnt boob), I was totally chuffed with how they turned out:

As a whole the year hasn’t been too bad, believe me i’ve had worse, much much worse, in fact in comparison to some years I have had 2011 has been remarkably peachy. All engagements, relocations & good times, with a few incredibly crappy moments thrown in for good measure.

And whilst i’m not trying to wish my life away, I must admit that there is something ever so satisfying about one year ending & another one starting, you know new beginnings, fresh starts & all that, so to 2011 I bid you an ever so slightly hasty adieu: